Chronic cancer: counseling the individual.

Advances in medicine significantly improved outcomes for many cancer patients, effectively moving it from an acute disease to a more chronic one. Living with a chronic cancer often prompts an existential search for meaning, as multiple losses impact the individual on a personal and familial level. At the same time, these patients must learn to adapt to the functional and relational changes necessitated by their disease. Two theoretical perspectives, meaning-making and family systems, are useful in understanding the experience of patients with chronic cancer and offering psychosocial interventions aimed at improving overall adjustment.